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Yes, You Might Be Becoming a Bit of a Jerk

Wudan Yan
Elemental
Published in
7 min readJul 15, 2020

Illustrations: Virginia Gabrielli

Since Washington state, where I live, instated its stay-at-home order over 100 days ago, I’ve noticed a number of changes in my behavior. First, the novelty of the Zoom hangouts wore off, and I found connecting with friends and family over video chat left me feeling more drained than fulfilled. I found this baffling, especially as an extrovert. Next, my fiancé noticed that I was getting snippier. At one point, he said, “It seems like right now you don’t have the capacity to be there for me, and that’s okay” — a statement that I did not view as an insult but the truth.

Most recently, on a walk with my dog — a sweet 65-pound German shepherd named June — a small, yippy, off-leash dog ran toward her. I tried to wrangle June while telling the other dog’s owner to leash her dog. This rapidly escalated into a screaming fight, during which a neighbor came out on his lawn to tell us, “I know we’re all a little wound up these days but…” (I didn’t hear the rest of it because I had turned around and left).

I don’t usually see myself as crass, uncaring, or volatile. And even though I am writing this for a sea of strangers, I like to think that my friends would agree. Every time I noticed myself acting…

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Elemental
Elemental

Published in Elemental

Elemental is a former publication from Medium for science-backed health and wellness coverage. Currently inactive and not taking submissions.

Wudan Yan
Wudan Yan

Responses (24)

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Hi Wudan, this article really resonated with me, and some great tips. I've found myself taking cold showers in the morning as a new habit for the last two weeks. Initially it was as a way to really wake myself up in the morning as I've found it a…

Great read, and very interesting. However, I think the people who are screaming in people's faces for wearing masks, causing scenes in stores - they have been assholes from the get-go.

Oh man, I relate. I often find myself wanting to go from one extreme of hiding away in my home and never seeing another human for years and then going out and wanting to say hi to everyone from teh sheer boredom of lockdown. And the…